Boys and Fruit Flies
by Bluedrgn52
Summary: There's a fruit fly infestation in Atlantis.


Title: Boys and Fruit Flies

Author: lj user="bluedrgn52"

Pairing: John Sheppard/Rodney McKay

Rating: PG

Spoilers: Not at all spoliery unless you've never seen the series at all and don't know who is who. Lol.

Word count: ~2000

Summary: Fruit Flies infest Atlantis. Yup. They do.

Author's Notes: Based in my general AU that I write in.

This story was inspired by my first annual summer infestation of fruit flies. We get them every year, and they sneak in and you see one or two and by the time you find where they are breeding, it's too late. So you hang fly paper everywhere, but it doesn't catch them all and soon enough 2 little tiny innocuous fruit flies turn into GIGANTIC SPAWN OF HELL and you want to poke your eyes out with a fork. So yeah, being that I'm mad about the damn things, I figured I'd write something to sooth my anger. What could make me feel better you ask? Fruit Flies + Boys, at least I'll get something out of it. (Plus I get to make them BIGGER and easier to KILL.)

Tags: author: bluedrgn52, rating: pg, AU

Disclaimer: Not mine, please don't sue me, Just borrowing these wonderful characters for my own personal use.

lj-cut text="Boys and Fruit Flies"

John walked around the hallways wondering if the little tiny bugs were in his head or not. Seeing as how no one else around him noticed them, he decided that his imagination was probably just playing tricks on him. He arrived at the conference room just in time to hear Rodney bitching about the lack of coffee.

"It's not like we're rationing the stuff now. We have plenty of it, so why can't there ever be a full pot in the room that I'm in?" Rodney bellowed. John smiled. Watching Rodney rant and rave was his favourite way to start a morning.

When Rodney swished the grounds in the coffee pot, three of the tiny bugs flew out of it.

"Ew." John said, making his presence known.

"They're like fruit flies. They're all over the place. They're too small for Atlantis to recognize and purge, so it looks like we're stuck with them for now." Rodney said pulling out a flyswatter from his pocket. "I carry protection with me."

John burst into laughter as soon as Ronon and Teyla walked in the room with Carter.

"What did we miss?" Ronon asked.

John was still bent over laughing when Rodney just rolled his eyes and smacked John in the arm with the swatter.

"We were just talking about the infestation." Rodney said.

"Protection McKay?" John chuckled and sat down, trying to compose himself.

"Well, I don't know if the little buggars bite or not. I plan on swatting them and killing as many as I can before they grow into a gigantic monster and eat us all." Rodney stated.

"Really Rodney, you think they're going to grow?" Carter asked rolling her eyes.

"You never know. We ARE on a foreign planet and all. Who knows if the animals here grow to 30 times their normal Earth size."

"I have never seen such bugs grow bigger than what they are now." Teyla said swatting one on her arm.

"They're just too small to shoot." Ronon added, "Making them a pain in the ass."

"So," Carter said, "Aside from the fruit fly infestation, what's been going on with everyone?"

Everyone started discussing the various things going on in the city while Rodney kept whacking at the fruit flies until Sheppard took away the swatter.

"They're going to grow and you're going to be sorry that you took it away from me!" Rodney shouted as the meeting broke up.

"We'll be offworld in a couple days Rodney, you won't have to worry about killing them then." John said.

"Of course, but what do I do between now and then?" Rodney said, "And when we come back, what's going to happen when they're the size of puppies?!"

John just rolled his eyes and walked Rodney off to his bedroom.

Rodney had hung fly paper all over the labs. The scientists couldn't really complain as it seemed to be doing its job, catching larger and smaller bugs alike. Anything the size of a bumblebee or smaller wasn't apparently deemed as hazardous to the city's systems, so after the second year they figured they should really stock on fly paper, swatters, and raid. Usually it was the swimming ant like creatures that caused a problem, but on this new planet, it looked like their new pest they love to hate was going to be fruit flies.

John walked into the labs getting Rodney for lunch and rolled his eyes at the fly paper. While it was a good idea and the labs seemed to be more bug free than any other part of the city, John would never admit that to Rodney.

"Whatcha doing buddy?" John asked.

"Just working on some catch up paperwork." Rodney said.

"Want lunch?"

"Sure." Rodney closed his laptop and followed John into the hall, but not before grabbing a can of insect repellent and spraying himself with it. "What?" he asked.

"Nothing. I just don't think that's going to help any. They're like fruit flies. They just buzz, eat, breed and die. I'm sure they'll all die off before it gets cold again." John said.

"We don't know what this planet is like. We don't know if it has a cold season. What if it never gets cold? What if they're permanent?!" Rodney said, as the realization of living with tiny bugs forever just hit him

"Teyla says she's seen them before and they die off within a month. Think of them like mayflies but much, much smaller." John said chuckling.

Rodney just snorted. They got to the mess and met up with Ronon and Teyla.

"I think they're growing." Ronon said, slapping one on his hand with a spoon.

"See! I'm not the only crazy person!" Rodney said his voice an entire octave higher.

"That would be unusual." Teyla said.

John just raised an eyebrow and pointed a fork at Teyla when Rodney looked at him for help. Ronon shrugged and went back to eating. Admitting defeat, Rodney also turned back to his food.

"No, but really Sam, they're growing!" Rodney said not even 12 hours later in Carter's office.

"Just hang more fly paper. Fruit flies DO grow for a bit, then they breed and die, so it's probably normal." Carter said.

"Yeah, sure." Rodney said, walking down the hallway back to the labs. It was almost too early for anyone to be in them yet, so Rodney went through the process of hanging another 10 strips of fly paper and taking the old ones down. He pulled down one strip and it had him running with it back to Carter's office.

"SEE!" Rodney said barging in the door, where Carter was sitting with Ronon, who had something trapped under a glass.

"Ronon was just pointing out to me that our bugs seem to be getting bigger." Carter said.

"I did too! But no one believed me! But now I have PROOF!" Rodney said, holding up the fly paper, showing a dead bug, definitely the same breed as the tiny bugs, but the size of a regular fly instead of a fruit fly.

Ronon pointed to the glass on Sam's desk, containing a live bug, about the same size.

"Of course, you had to catch a live one to prove your superiority over me…again." Rodney said, then waving his hand dismissing it. "It doesn't matter, we have an infestation of these bugs in the city and now they're growing."

"Hang more fly paper, everywhere, and tell everyone to start actively killing them if they weren't already," Carter said, "hopefully this is as big as they get."

"May flies McKay" John said.

"Great." Rodney said, "Pegasus May Flies from HELL!"

"They about the same size, and they're spawning in a similar way too. Maybe they're like May Flies." John suggested.

"They're still growing John." Teyla said, "I've never seen insects like this one."

"Me either." Ronon grunted out, smacking one with a fly swatter and looking like he wished they would grow even bigger so he could shoot them.

Just then, Carter walked in. "We've got a problem" she said.

"What is it now? Monkey's invading and we let them because they're cute? Or perhaps we just let…."

"Rodney!" Carter screamed and when he shut up, she continued, "They've gained access to some of the ventilation shafts. We figured that would happen eventually, so we placed filters in them, but the problem is that they got through somehow and now they're affecting the life support systems. While it's not a big deal when we have fresh air and all…"

"But it could be if we have to use the shield or star drive." Rodney finished for her.

"I take it this means we're not going offworld today." John said looking sullen.

"Sorry guys, I'm sending Lorne's team instead. We need Rodney here to help us reconfigure the ventilation systems to see if we can't expel the bugs in there."

John, Teyla and Ronon all sighed and Rodney stood up, grabbing his tablet and marched down to the control room.

Expelling the bugs turned out to be fairly easy. As they weren't using the ventilation system for life support, they just blocked the passages, pressurized it and then released the pressure; reducing the bugs to splatter against the walls or pieces blown outside. "Gross, but effective", as Carter put it. They resealed them with cheesecloth, enough to keep the bugs out, but still allow ventilation.

However, there was still a problem with all the bugs that WEREN'T in the ventilation shafts and were now swarming over the city. Growing and swarming. One of the science geeks pointed out that they reminded him of the clouds from the game Diablo II: Lord of Destruction. He said, "You know, when you're in the jungle and there's a black cloud swarming around you." It was a fairly accurate description.

Rodney kept telling people "I told you so" and refused to leave his labs, which were fortified with fly paper, swatters and cans of raid and OFF. When he did leave, which was usually only to the mess hall, he was completely covered with netting. They didn't bite, but he wasn't taking any chances.

Most people resigned to go the other direction when they heard the buzzing noise, and simply adjusted to the bugs being in the city for the time being. They'd rather have it bug infested than Wraith infested.

Rodney had been configuring the sensors to purge the bugs, but they refused to, seeing as how they weren't a threat, simply a nuisance. He had been working on it for two days when Ronon came into the labs with another "specimen". This one had grown to about the size of a golf ball.

"I can shoot them now." Ronon said smiling, which in itself was disturbing.

"Good. Go forth and kill." Rodney said. Ronon smirked and ran off with his gun over his shoulder. "Just don't shoot any critical systems in the process!" Rodney screamed after him.

"If I input the size into the system, there is a good chance Atlantis will purge them all." Rodney said, grabbing the jar from Sheppard's hands. About five minutes of clicking and scanning later, Atlantis figured (with Rodney's help) that the bugs were a threat and started flushing them out. The strange thing is no one knew how. One second the bugs were there and then the next they were gone. Rodney chalked it up to being another strange thing that the city did and shrugged.

John told Carter about Rodney figuring out how to get rid of them and she laughed at it, saying she won the betting pool as to "how long McKay could go before he either nuked them or found a way around the city's systems." John only wished he knew about it so he could have been on it too. Ronon sulked around for a while, as he only got to shoot about thirty of them before Rodney got the city to do her purge. Teyla was just glad that the city didn't smell of OFF anymore, as it really irritated her.

Rodney and John were in Carter's office giving her a report on the purging.

"We think that it should recognize them in their small forms so in the future, if this happens again, we'll be able to purge them right away. Actually Atlantis will probably do it before I get the chance to. I can't believe she didn't think space bugs that grew were a threat." Rodney snorted, "It can detect microbes and germs, but it can't detect fruit flies of doom."

John and Carter both chuckled.

"Good job Rodney. Hopefully we won't have to worry about them in the future." Carter said laughing.

"So…" John said, turning to Rodney as they were leaving Carter's office, "Want to play golf, I think Ronon still has that one in the jar."

Rodney just rolled his eyes and followed Sheppard around the corner.


End file.
